


our howling galaxy

by Zaiya (iqoras)



Category: Original Work
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-10
Updated: 2016-09-10
Packaged: 2019-03-08 03:24:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13449510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iqoras/pseuds/Zaiya
Summary: The galaxy was howling, blue certainty evolving into something terrible and beautiful. That’s the beginning. The truth of all starts, of all beginnings, is something that humanity cringes away from. It’s an unpleasant stain on the wall of their history, something that they can distract from and disguise.The thing about beginnings is that they all start with an end. And my end, the end that allowed this beginning to come about, happens with a great amount of crimson blood splashing into cerulean and coaxing the universe into a vibrant, hopeful purple .I’m not here to tell you about the new beginning. My name is Mathias Rivera and I’m going to tell you about how I became a murderer.





	our howling galaxy

* * *

The galaxy was howling, blue certainty evolving into something terrible and beautiful. That’s the beginning. The truth of all starts, of all beginnings, is something that humanity cringes away from. It’s an unpleasant stain on the wall of their history, something that they can distract from and disguise.

        The thing about beginnings is that they all start with an end. And my end, the end that allowed this beginning to come about, happens with a great amount of crimson blood splashing into cerulean and coaxing the universe into a vibrant, hopeful _purple_.

        I’m not here to tell you about the new beginning. My name is Mathias Rivera and I’m going to tell you about how I became a murderer.

* * *

When I first noticed that I was on fire, I was calm. _This is inconvenient_ , I thought, shock quite possibly crushing me into stillness. Then, just as I began to feel the pain, a sudden splash of coolness fell over me. Malachi stood in front of me, panting, his face flushed and his blue eyes wide with anger.

        “You look like you’re the one who was on fire,” I said, gaze trailing down as I took in the damage. It really wasn’t that bad, I supposed, but flame was still flame and it certainly had done its work. I’d be needing a new suit before my next mission.

        “You’re an idiot!” Malachi was still angry, his petite form almost shaking with the emotion. He got like this often. He was even worse last year, after I had been impaled on an Ironsnake’s blade. The Ironsnake had come out worse than me but if Malachi were to be believed, the results weren’t worth the hurt I had been dealt.

        He was over-emotional.

        “This is why I’m chosen for these jobs,” I began, giving a perfunctory glance to a burn on my left arm, “And you’re not.” His explosiveness prevented him from being detached on missions. There was also the fact that he was heir to the Rothawk’s makeshift throne.

        “You could die,” Malachi finally exploded, hands thrusting out. It was as if his emotion was a current of negative energy, battling against the cage of skin keeping it trapped within. Something in me burned and for a moment I entertained the idea that the flames hadn’t quite been put out. Then, just as coolness had killed the fire from before, so too did I kill the feelings attempting to make themselves known.

        “And?” I leveled him with an unaffected glare. “I’m expendable, Mal.” I met his eyes for a few seconds and that was all I could take. His blue was too raw. It was with an uncomfortable frown that I turned away and left to report on the success of my latest mission.

        My target had been neutralized. It hadn’t been a complicated mission—actually rather easy in comparison to my usual jaunts of danger. The only mishap had been the delayed explosive planted on my bag. It had malfunctioned and burst into flames, hence the fire from before.

        I entered the reporting room and looked around, taking in the dim lighting contrasting with the hopeful faces crowding in the room. It was organized chaos. On the far left side of the large room, Elena grimaced at a nasty, scabbed wound on her shoulder, the skin around it red and discolored. There was a gleam to the wound—the light reflecting off of the liquid of infection. The wound had actually been harder to look at two weeks ago when she’d initially received it but it didn’t seem like it was healing too well.

        Elena saw me and her disgusted expression turned into a grin. “Mathias! Over here, you filthy brute, I was just about to go looking for you.”

        “I’m not a brute.” I rolled my eyes at her as I approached. She scoffed.

        “Ah, but you don’t argue the filthy part, do you?” She raised her eyebrows at me in amusement, taking in the grime I’d acquired over my mission. I hadn’t yet had a chance to go to the cleansing room and I was still sporting the gore I’d caused. “This is all someone else’s, I take it?” Her nose scrunched up as she pointed at a particularly bloody patch on my sleeve.

        “Most of it,” I shrugged. “What did you need me for?”

        “We’ve got another hit, oh mighty slayer of the Ironsnakes. Three days from now, 1600, the biggest target we’ve ever had.” She waited for a response, probably savoring the power she had over me at that moment. I sighed and gave in.

        “Alright,” I said. “Who is it?”

        “Zaler Drabek, Ironsnake, current leader of the Allied land of Pangea. In other words, the leader of our world and greatest political enemy.” She said the words slowly, reveling in the sound and in the way that my eyes widened at the name.

        “Elena.” My voice was clipped. “This isn’t a joke? I thought that Karenena was still waiting—that we weren’t ready for this yet. I haven’t even spoken to her about my latest mission. The last I heard, this wouldn’t be happening for another two years.”

        “Not a joke,” she grinned. “Karenena has been working hard and the perfect opportunity has presented itself.”

        I looked around, taking in the organized chaos of the room with a completely different eye than before. There was always a sense of purpose in the movements of the newly returned but there was something more than that now. There was _hope_ —pure, unadulterated hope shining beneath all of the faces in the room. I had been blind to it, had looked past it, but it was undeniable.

        “Go shower and do whatever you have to do. We’re leaving tomorrow morning and won’t be back until everything is finished. It’s time for a revolution, my friend.”

        Change was coming to Pangea.

* * *

After showering and ridding myself of my ruined clothes—they were discarded and I was supplied with new ones, fresh, clean, flexible, and as durable as they came—the wound on my arm was treated in the infirmary. I found the burn insignificant, barely noticeable, but the medics tutted and muttered amongst themselves. There was a crease of concern in Sandara’s brow.

        “You can’t go out like this,” she told me firmly. “You always come back like this, Mathias! Your health is paramount to the success of our operations and we don’t have many resources to spare. I can’t continue zapping you to health every time you return.”

        “I don’t ask you to,” I said simply, meeting her gaze with a stern stare of my own. It was true. I never asked for her to waste Remedium on me—a medical technology so advanced that it could heal in minutes what would normally take months. It was expensive and the supplies to power the healing machine were rare and hard to come by. “If anyone needs your attention, it’s Elena. Her shoulder isn’t doing well.”

        Sandara glowered at me, turning on her heel to pace across the room. The other medics shared looks with each other, as if to say, _here we go again_. When Sandara went off on a rant, it was hard to get a word in edgewise, let alone to reason with her.

        “I shouldn’t even be wasting Remedium on you! There isn’t enough for me to treat every soldier we have. This resource is precious and meant for the Line and those related to it. You know this, Mathias.” The Line were the core of the Rothawk movement. They were our royalty, our nobility—they were the political force while Elena and I and the other soldiers like us were the ones providing actual fact. We were lesser; we were replaceable.

        I knew that this system wasn’t one of malice—many members of the Line had protested this favoritism but that’s how things needed to be. They were important and Remedium truly was valuable. There wasn’t enough to go around.

        My expression shadowed at Sandara’s words, an unwelcome reminder of my special treatment. I didn’t ask for Remedium, for _healing_ —I didn’t want it for myself. My place was with the soldiers. If they were to suffer through their wounds, so too should I. And yet—

        “He cares about you,” Sandara said, her voice softer now, dark eyes understanding. She held the healing machine in her hand, the small white rod deceptively unimpressive. She was once again at my side, Remedium scanning over my wound, healing, knitting, _fixing._ “He gives up part of his own share of things so that you won’t be in pain.”

        Malachi.

        Malachi was the reason why I was allowed Remedium instead of facing regular, natural treatment.  The thought of me receiving aid when others didn’t filled me with shame but the effort that Malachi went to assure that I was treated soothed the shame and brought the peculiar emotion in my chest back to life.

        “I know,” I said. Sandara huffed in disbelief but didn’t dispute me further.

        Malachi was waiting for me outside of the infirmary. His eyes, a clearer blue now that he wasn’t so worried, immediately went to my arm to asses. When he was satisfied that I was healed, he grinned at me. “Welcome back, Mathias.” He looked so completely happy, so at peace, and something about it struck me as odd. Surely he knew?

        “You saw me earlier,” I said blandly. His lips quirked in amusement and his hands moved restlessly at his sides, as if they were ravenous creatures, wanting something desperately that Malachi was doing his best to keep from them. I knew then that no, he didn’t know. They hadn’t told him about my new assignment. He would have had the power to veto me being chosen for it but now that it was in motion, I doubted he’d be able to do a thing.

        Not that I wanted him to, of course. This was what I was made for. Assassinations, dangerous jobs—things that no one else but me could do. I was talented at what I did, everyone knew it, and I wouldn’t even think about putting someone else in danger while I stayed here and relaxed in safety.

        Even if safety and who it entailed was so appealing. My eyes trailed over Malachi. He was so small. Not sheltered, no—none of them were, anymore, and Malachi, heir to the Rothawks, couldn’t afford to be naïve. But his form _was_ small, his shoulders petite and his frame built for speed and grace. He was wired with muscle and would have been great for missions quite like the ones that I went on if he weren’t so valuable.

        “Mathias.” He sounded pleased, his voice quiet, and it was all I could do to swallow and avert my gaze.

        “I leave again tomorrow,” I blurted. My pulse was being unruly. It was acting up like a child—told to sit down, to be calm and quiet, but unable to prevent itself from moving and wreaking havoc. At my words, the air went silent with tension and when I dared to look up again, Malachi’s expression was frozen, a conflicted emotion caught within his eyes.

        “Elena told me,” I continued. I don’t know why I felt the need to reassure him but reassure I did. “We leave tomorrow morning. Plans have. . . accelerated.” I grimaced at how big of an understatement that was.

        Malachi’s eyebrows furrowed together. I was sent off often—it wasn’t unusual for me to come back only to be deployed as soon as I was clean. He sighed and smiled ruefully at me. Either he didn’t notice that I left out who my target was or he didn’t want to ask me. A surge of relief flowed through me.

        “Well, nothing we can do about that, is there?” He shrugged and grabbed my wrist, pulling me after him. Where his fingers touched my skin, I burst into flames once again, but I ignored it and followed him. “Let’s go, rogue of the Rothawks. I missed you.”

* * *

The Allied land of Pangea hasn’t always been as it is now. We’re told that there were once many nations. More than that, there were once multiple continents—the lands weren’t all connected together. We were separated by seas and great distances. There were many governments and many wars.

        Then, after centuries of movement, the lands came together again and the people were united. There was another war. It was a common time of panic and madness.  Eventually, powerful parties inserted themselves into control. Order once again reigned throughout the land and the different peoples learned how to live together.

        There was no longer an “us vs them”. We were all one people. A government was established by the Rothawks, initially, and for a while we reigned unquestioned. The Rothawks were good at maintaining peace. Malachi’s grandmother was the last Rothawk in the government of Pangea.

        A political group calling themselves the Ironsnakes began to make noise. First with rumors. Then riots in the streets, where innocents were trampled and unrest was bred. They targeted the government, irritated with their lack of power, and they took control when the Rothawk were most vulnerable.

        Malachi’s grandmother was sick. Her son was away, with his pregnant wife and Malachi’s mother, waiting as Malachi was born. It was the perfect opportunity. Zaler Drabek, then only nineteen years old, performed a perfect coup d'état.

        She and her Ironsnake comrades seized control in the middle of the night. Throughout all of Pangea, Rothawks were thrown from office. Families were killed, children were orphaned, and power was stolen. Identifying with the Rothawk cause became taboo—not explicitly illegal but as good as. Those brave enough to identify with the cause openly found themselves murdered or dumped on the streets.

        Pangea became a land of blood and fear. And Zaler ruled over it all, carefully removed from the carnage of her rule. Her public persona was one of dark humor and removed emotion. She was a tactician, a prodigy, and certainly a good ruler. If she had been on the side of the Rothawk, we never would have been defeated.

        But our cause, the Rothawk cause, would not have stood for the blood that follows Zaler around. Malachi’s family either would have kept her in a moral line or would have ended up warring with her.

        Now we stood in the dark, meeting in our secret tunnels and in forgotten corners of the continent. The Rothawk were rebels hiding in shadows, slowly working toward a future where we could all be safe. Where we wouldn’t be condemned for our allegiance or our beliefs. Zaler had become a dictator and had made a world where the people could not freely use their voices. This was not a world or a government that the people of Pangea would tolerate for much longer.

        By the end of this week, the universe would be alight with something new.

* * *

Malachi led me to his room. His bedroom was a simple area, not anywhere as lavish as the other heirs and nobility tended to keep their rooms. It looked like a soldier’s area, pristine and white. The only nudge to his office was his bed—it was large and covered with a red, soft comforter. The addition of the bed and some other details of life spilling throughout the room made it oddly. . . personal.

        I stepped in, taking it all in. I’d been there a few times before but Malachi and I didn’t often visit in our private areas—we spent time in the library or the training room, or any other number of places.

        _Click_. Malachi closed the door behind us.

        “How are you?” he asked, moving further into the room and collapsing on his bed, a heap of a boy splayed out over the luxurious mattress. I couldn’t help rolling my eyes, though I knew he couldn’t see it.

        “I’m fine, Mal.” I sat down on the edge of his bed, watching him. “How have things been here? Has Jaz been as unbearable as always?”

        Those questions were all that he needed. He sat up, his legs crossed comfortably, leaning back on his arms, and charged into an explanation of everything I’d missed while on my mission. He was animated and passionate while he spoke, taking on a different expression for each person he spoke about. His irritation was unique, his amusement when he laughed about something that had happened was dynamic, and his eyes were (as always, as always, as always) bluer than the ocean.

        As he told his stories, my posture relaxed. I was pulled further onto the bed and together Malachi and I leaned against his headboard. Our shoulders pressed together and Malachi’s hands gestured wildly in front of the both us as he narrated.

        “ _Then_ —and can you believe this, Mathias? Elena picked up the food and threw it at him! I’m sure Jaz hadn’t been expecting that when he’d bumped into her—and he obviously meant to make her spill. He’s really an idiot. The food stuck to his forehead.” His shoulders shook with laughter as he relived the story, his eyes distant and bright. The laughter moved through his body and vibrated through my shoulder.

        “Oh, I can believe that,” I said lightly, smiling at him. Jaz had a talent for aggravating people as it was. Combine that with Elena’s temper and it’s a miracle that she’d settled at throwing food. “I’m surprised she didn’t try to take a finger in retaliation.”

        “Yeah, well, I bet you that Jaz will try something tomorrow at second meal, so she can always take a finger then.” Malachi’s head cocked to the side, thinking. “No, wait—she’s leaving with you, isn’t she?”

        I nodded slowly.

        “I don’t know why I didn’t think to ask earlier,” he continued, face now clouded with thought and confusion, “but who is your target? Another Ironsnake politician threatening us?”

        “No.” My voice was clipped now and unease had once again made me stiffen. Malachi looked at me in wonder, lips turned down, and placed a hand on my arm. He was probably trying to soothe me but his touch only worked to make me withdraw further.

        “Then who?” His fingers tightened over my skin, digging in, and he sounded stern now. He was looking angrier and angrier by the second, piecing things together in his mind. By the time I opened my mouth to speak, his lips were pressed together in displeasure, eyebrows furrowed. He knew, he definitely knew, but still I spoke.

        “Zaler Drabek.”

        “No!” The word was a snarl and it was instant. Without taking his hand from my arm, Malachi moved so that he was more easily facing me. “No way, Mathias, _no_.”

        “It’s not up to you,” I said.

        “It’s too dangerous!”

        “That’s exactly why Elena and I have been chosen,” I reminded him. For the most difficult mission, the most skilled mercenaries should go. “Would you rather someone else go? Someone who doesn’t know how to defend themselves?”

        “Yes!” He met my eyes for a moment, only a moment, and then sank into himself, gaze dropping and anger fleeing. “No. I wouldn’t want that. But I don’t want you to be hurt.”

        I reached out and pushed his chin up, freeing blue from hiding. “Better me than someone else.” _I’m expendable._ My words from earlier today echoed in my mind—and I wasn’t ignorant to how true they were. _Better me than you_.

        “No,” he whispered, denying. “Better that you live, Mathias. Better that you’re safe.” The arm that wasn’t still holding mine lifted, pulling my hand from his chin. He didn’t let me go and I didn’t pull away.

        “You’re important,” he said.

        “I’m replaceable.”

        I met his stare for a long moment.

        “Not to me.”

* * *

I met Elena the next morning. I slipped through the dark hallways, filled with the sighs of ghosts and the cursing of pasts and futures—with the calm air of a world before waking. It was early and most people were still lost to their dreams or the blessed darkness they found solace in instead. I found Elena by Weapon Room C, the one that she and I always chose. It was sort of a joke, really—Weapon Room A was where we should have been based on skill, but this was our small way of defying the class system of our world. The mutt weapons for the mutt mercenaries.

        “About time you got here,” Elena smirked. She was leaning against the wall, one leg holding her weight, and there was humor in her breath.

        “I’m early,” I replied, because it was true. We weren’t to meet for another twenty minutes to begin preparations but Elena never followed the rules and as such I’d learned to come earlier than early.

        “Not as early as you could have been.” Her smirk turned suggestive, eyes taking me in. “Bet you were reluctant to get up, huh?”

        “I don’t know what you mean.” I was frowning at her.

        “Oh, sure,” she purred. “You weren’t in your room earlier—I was going to surprise you. So where could little Mathias have gotten to?”

        “I don’t know,” I mocked her, “Maybe the baths, or the med bay, or the training room. Who knows?”

        She laughed openly at this. “I don’t think so. Unless Malachi’s bed is now being referred to as the training room?” She grinned predatorily. “In that case, I’ll have to visit soon. In fact, we do have some time before we have to go—maybe I should just drop in right now and get some training in?”

        I lunged at her, my forearm going against her throat and pinning her to the wall. “Shut the hell up, Elena. Leave Malachi out of this.” She grunted and pushed against me, her knee going up into my side, but I didn’t let her go. I pushed harder against her throat for a moment, waited for her to start coughing, and finally stepped away.

        “You’re my partner, ‘Lena,” I told her. “I would save you over any of the fool soldiers here, you know that. I would die for you. But don’t you bring Malachi into this.”

        She glowered at me, catching her breath, and the humor of her personality was gone. She had become a bitter energy. “Yeah, whatever.” She ran a hand over her clothing, straightening out any wrinkles that I might have caused. “But I’m not the only one who could have seen you, you know. You’re lucky it was me. The heir and a mercenary? _Really_?” She shook her head in disgust.

        “It’s not like that—“ At her scoff, my denial died down and I turned to the ground, face flushing. I had spent the night with Malachi, yes, but I knew my place. _Malachi_ knew my place. I was expendable—he was the heir. I knew this. I didn’t have any hopes, not really. “I just want a chance to be happy,” I said, voice low and desperate.

        Her fury retreated, still beneath the surface but making way for compassion and reason. “I know, Mathias. Me too.” She patted my arm and began leading me into the Weapon Room. “But if someone found out about you two, you’d be gone.” Her voice cracked and she took a moment to clear her throat, her back turned toward me. “And I don’t want to lose you, too.”

        “Okay,” I said, the word barely making a sound.

* * *

The road was hot and the wind was fierce, blowing dust up against the masks covering our faces and protecting our eyes. We were unrecognizable as ourselves. We were no longer Elena and Mathias—our personalities and lives and reservations were left back at headquarters. When we donned our uniforms, we were monikers of death. We were the shadows of the Rothawks, the forces that worked unnoticed. We were unforgiving, black figures of doom.

        I hated these uniforms.

        We had left the compound five hours earlier, when the day was still cool and the sky caring. Because our mission was so important, Karenena herself had seen us off. She had called us to her office, a large, professional room, and had smiled detachedly at us. The briefing was filled to the brim with Karenena’s usual bullshit. I tuned her out but Elena, who has always found companionship in Karenena’s cold humor, payed enough attention for the both of us.

        As it was, my train of thought had been completely lost when I caught sight of Malachi through the window of Elena’s office, standing in the hall. Our eyes met for a moment and he smiled. “Good luck,” he mouthed at me and then he walked away. My attention was pulled back to the office when Elena nudged my side and together the two of us stepped through Karenena’s transporter. With the aid of the transporter, we were able to cross amazing distances without the hassle of wasted time. Pangea had become easy to travel. _Most_ of the time.

        “I wish we could have just TP’ed straight to the Capital,” Elena complained, voice only slightly muffled by the mask covering her face.

        “You know that’s not possible,” I reminded her gently. “The teleporters are monitored. We only have access to a few dispersed across the continent. The Ironsnakes control all of the others.” Otherwise, we would have teleported—or TP’d, as people liked to call it—straight to the Capital. Occasionally, our organization took chances and used Ironsnake TPs. They had so many dispersed across Pangea that it was nearly impossible for them to watch all of them. Our current mission was too important to risk, however, so Elena and I were instead forced to TP to whichever Rothawk safe point was closest to the Capital.

        “I know!” Elena wailed. “But it’s so hot here! I’m used to the _snow_ , Mathias, the snow. Not this… this… this gross heat.”

        I rolled my eyes at her, though she couldn’t see it through my mask. “You know, this area of Pangea—when there were still oceans dividing the world—it used to be known for its cold. It was called Canada.”

        “I don’t care about the past,” she scoffed. “It’s hot now and that’s all that matters.”

        I was about to reply when I saw a movement. Elena and I were currently in a sun-abused, torn down city. Once, perhaps, there had been many people living here but now it was simply another glimpse into the past on the roadside journey between cities. Occasionally a traveler would see small villages made in the rubble, or nomads camping underneath sinking ceilings, but this area was otherwise empty because of the heat.

        “Elena,” I began, voice quiet. Her complaints died on her lips and she cocked her head in my direction, probably wondering at my sudden change. This is why we worked so well together—we had been partners forever. Small changes were enough for either of us to know that something was wrong.

        Again, to our left, movement caught my eye. A flash of black could be seen contrasting against the yellow and blue of the sky. As we passed through some cover, the rubble of an old building briefly blocking us from view of our pursuers, Elena and I ducked and took cover. Our backs went to a tan, brick wall and though I knew the movement was useless, since my face was covered, I smiled. Perhaps it was only because Elena couldn’t see me that I dared to grin.

        “Play you for it,” I said. She scoffed and raised her hands, positioning herself for the game.

        “On three, then,” she agreed. My hands came up, facing hers in readiness. “One. Two.” A rock clacked against the ground, again to the left, coming closer. “Three.”

        “Rock, paper, scissors,” we whispered in unison. I came up with paper and she with rock.

        “I win.” If I sounded smug, Elena didn’t comment on it. If the slight sag of her posture was anything to judge by, she was actually relieved.

        “Okay, fine,” she dismissed me. “Go do your thing.”

        I faced her for a moment, my winning hand patting her shoulder. Her breath sucked in and she pulled away, composing herself a second too late. Her injury—a brief flash of the scabbed infection gleaming on her shoulder played when I blinked. “Elena, did you not go to the healers before we left?”

        Whatever she might have said in answer to my urgency was lost. Another clatter of rock interrupted the conversation, the sound too close for me to continue ignoring. I glared at her shoulder, covered by our lightly armored uniforms, and turned away to claim the prize of winning our game.

* * *

Whoever it was that was attempting to follow us would never last in a field of stealth. As I watched the three lumbering figures shuffle around, I wondered if they’d have continued stalking us if they knew who it was they were following. One look at the tallest one’s eyes, hard and mean, and I knew that they would have.

        Well, that made my job easier to accept from a moral standpoint.

        I killed the first one with a piece of rubble they’d kicked to the side. Waste not want not, I thought to myself as the rock connected with the side of the woman’s face. A gurgling sound of surprise left her throat as she fell to the ground, so I lifted the heavy stone and stared down at her.

        She wasn’t wearing any particular uniform but she was definitely under someone’s employment. Her clothing was too high-grade for common mercenary or bandit kind. Despite the heat, she was wearing a turtle-necked, black shirt. The right of her face, where I’d surprised her, was caved in, half of her nose sinking into her broken cheek.

        Her hand twitched and I threw the stone down again with greater force than before. It cracked against her skull but the loudest sound was one of wetness and breaking meat.

        The second one had an easier death, solely because he was being careless. He was staring off into a distance, not at all guarded, and he barely flinched when my knife stabbed through his neck. It pierced through the back and went all the way to the front. I yanked it out through the left and any hope the man may have had of survival left him.

        On this one, I found more evidence of employment. I searched his pocket and in it I found an Ironsnake pendant. “What are you doing here?” I whispered, eyes going over the dead man’s face, as if searching for an answer. The Ironsnakes had no business being in this section of Pangea—this was an area of infamous dead lands, heat, and misery. It was here that all of Pangea thought the ghosts of the Rothawks layed.

        I had enough questions by the time I faced off the third and final stalking snake that he had a bit of a bad time. His eyes were the hardest and the meanest, perhaps, but Elena and I were the best for a reason. The bit of skill that the man _did_ have—and he had a measureable amount—was irrelevant when I nearly cut off one of his feet, severing the ankle most of the way through, and held him to the ground with the threat of my gun pointed at him.

        I crouched down beside the whimpering man, my head tilted to the side. I must have looked like a demon in my uniform, solid black and splattered with blood. “Who are you?” I asked.

        “R—Robert Giovani,” he sobbed. I tutted at him.

        “Not your name, man. Who among the Ironsnake are you? What is your importance?” When he paled in defiance, I sighed, my gun prodding him on. “Don’t lie to me, Robert.”

        “We were ju—just here on orders. Our commander heard ‘bout a Rotten camp round here and we was supposed to come check it out, that’s all.”

        I grimaced at his grammar.

        “We was supposed to kill the Rottens, all the grown ones.”

        “And the Rothawk children?” I asked, voice deceptively encouraging. I dropped my gun slightly, as if his reasons made sense to me, as if I sympathized. As if this all might be a misunderstanding. He spoke more confidently at the prospect of survival.

        “Well, they’re no use, are they? We do whatever we want with ‘em, commander said.”

        “That’s nice of him. What were you planning to do to them?”

        “It’s been a long time since I’ve seen my wife,” he replied. “And it’s because of these Rotten brats that I haven’t gotten any, y’know. So they would _compensate_. There’s nothing quite like a child, especially when they cry.”

        The reply was what I was expecting but I still felt sick. That’s all I’d needed to hear. I stood up slowly, expression indiscernible through my mask. When I made my way back to Elena, she didn’t ask what had taken me so long.

        She didn’t ask about the screaming, either.

        This is why Pangea needed change. This is why the Ironsnake needed to go.

* * *

We reached the Capital on schedule. Our telltale uniforms came off outside the city and found rest inside of our packs. We donned the clothes of civilians, of the poor majority who should have ruled this place by their numbers but were instead stomped on by the rich minority.

        The guards at the gate were impervious to our plans. They were ignorant, so good our disguises, and therefore unaffected by our identities. We walked through the gates with dirt on our faces. I deployed a false limp and Elena pretended to aid me in my walk into the city. No one looked at us twice. No one noticed us.

        It was only after we were far into the city that we allowed ourselves to stop, pulling into an alleyway between high walls that were close together, no more than three feet between them. In the shadow of the high-rising walls, where the brick seemed to be pressing in on either side of us and where the sun had no hope of seeing us, we allowed ourselves to breathe.

        Elena seemed uninterested in our surroundings. Understandably, too—we’d had many missions into the Capital, though none as high-risk as the one we were burdened with now. Elena had lived here once, too, before she was recruited by the Rothawks. She had joined the Rothawks when she was fifteen and when I was nine.  We hadn’t started working together until I was fourteen. She never told me about her time in the Capital but I imagine that things were much different when she was a child.

        Elena may not have wanted to look around, but my eyes were taking in everything. I was empty, colorless, and the information around me was filling me up. If I leaned just right, I could see out of the alleyway that we were in with little chance of anyone else seeing us.

        It was dirty. It smelled. The people passing by in an ever-constant stream of business looked beaten down and stern. Of the hoards I saw pass us by, I counted only ten smiles, and most of them were brief. The streets were small and twisting, high buildings on both sides, hidden alleys like the one Elena and I were in sneaking off between houses. Many of the houses were colored but the paint, once happy and maintained, was now faded and shades darker with grime.

“Ugly, isn’t it?” Elena asked, her voice coming from my side. I turned to her and smiled wearily. The Capital in this state must be anathema to her.

        The Capital had once been beautiful. Zaler Drabek had ruined that.

* * *

Execution day had arrived. The final act had officially reached us. We were almost at the new beginning. All that was left was for Zaler to die. I had never been so eager for a mission to end. Neither had I ever dreaded the ending quite so much.

        Once again, Elena and I found ourselves in uniform, sans the masks. We were at the House of Unity, where Zaler was scheduled to speak to the public any moment now. It was a frivolous thing, unimportant, but Zaler and her elite guard would be gone long enough for us to sneak into the building and station ourselves. At 1600 hours, ten minutes from now, Zaler would return, her guard trailing behind her to take up position and parole the area.

        Elena and I made our way in. We came in through a back window. Years of training and years of experience paid off: we were unbothered. We didn’t have time to explore the House of Unity, Zaler’s home, but the hall that we walked down was fascinating. On either side of us, paintings hung from the walls. They were of pristine cities, of night views, of the stars, and of the constellations. The beauty was grotesque. How dare Zaler fill this place with fingerprints of her humanity, of her life, of her _privilege_ , when her people were dying in the streets?

        I pointedly refused to take in any of the finery around me as Elena and I made our way into Zaler’s room. It is a hard thing to do when you are surrounded by reminders of someone’s breath, but I did my best to forget that Zaler was human.

        “Look at this,” Elena said, picking up a small notebook from a side table. She flipped it open and began going through it, a grin slowly spreading across her face. I closed the curtains to the only window in the room, once again hiding us from the sun.  “She keeps a diary. Do you think Karenena would like this?”

        “Probably,” I said, moving to the wall beside the door so I could lean against it. Elena shoved the diary into her bag and pulled Zaler’s chair into the center of the room, facing the door, and reclined in it.

        1558 hours. Two minutes left.

        There is movement in the hall and I know that Zaler has arrived early. Elena meets my eye. She’s smiling.  I turn off the light and we’re left in darkness.

        The door handle moves and I steady my grip on my knife.

        Zaler opens the door and moves into the room, humming to herself. She doesn’t turn on the light until after she’s closed the door. Her cheerfulness is as grotesque as the beauty of her house and it leaves me gritting my teeth. My irritation is so much that I don’t wait for Zaler—I flick on the light of my own accord and watch with satisfaction as Zaler freezes. She’s not facing me but if Elena’s predatory smirk is anything to judge by, Zaler is surprised.

        “Hello,” I say.

        Surprisingly, she doesn’t scream. She glances at me over her shoulder—takes in my knife and the weapons strapped around my hips—and then calmly walks over to her desk. “Hello,” she replies, and she sounds thoroughly resigned. The tilt of her lips is sad, expectant, and her lack of terror rubs me the wrong way. I frown at her.

        She is a beautiful woman, that’s undeniable. Her hair is brown and shoulder length. Her eyes are intelligent but kind. She is not what I have been expecting.

        “You’re here to kill me,” she says, as if responding to my confusion. Her voice is quiet but firm. “Okay. Do it.”

        “I. . .” I’m at a loss. I don’t know what I would have said had it been just me there, but Elena makes up for my hesitation. Her short sword finds an exit through Zaler’s stomach, sudden and without warning. Zaler’s eyes go wide and she looks down, hands hovering in wonder. Elena had moved behind Zaler while she was addressing me, soundlessly leaving the seat she’d been in.

        “Oh,” Zaler whispers. She looks at me once more, sees my expression, and she _laughs_. Then her eyes fix over my shoulder and unfocus, death stealing her away. Elena pulls her sword from Zaler’s body and the corpse falls forward with a thump, blood leaking out from her to make a halo.

        Elena was no longer smirking. She looked panicked, an animalistic emotion forcing itself onto her face. Was that betrayal? _What?_ Surely she wasn’t upset about killing Zaler. On this mission, I’d been responsible for most of the deaths but usually Elena and I were fairly evenly matched.

        Death was no foreign entity to either of us; it was a friend, familiar and ugly. And Elena, more than anyone else that I knew, should be happy about the death of the leader of the Ironsnakes.

        “Very good,” a voice said. _Karenena_.  “You two did well.”

        I stepped forward to Elena’s side, taking a position of solidarity. It was strange for Karenena to be here, in the middle of the Capital—especially with Zaler’s Ironsnake guards still patrolling the area—but the moment of panic on Elena’s face still seemed out of place.

        This felt like a dream.

        Neither Elena nor I spoke.

        Karenena was smiling at us, a group of five behind her. They were other Rothawk mercenaries—I recognized them. I’d never gotten to know any of them as well as I knew Elena, but they were common faces. I’d even gone on a mission with one of them before.

        “You did so well. Things really couldn’t have gone any better than they did. Congratulations, Mathias, Elena.”  

        “Thank you,” I said, monotonous, the words only coming out because of my raising. Unlike Elena, who had grown up in the Capital and away from either party, I had been raised at the Rothawk compound. The manners of my class level were second-nature to me. I was a weapon, I was never to forget that, but I was a weapon that would never disrespect a member of the Rothawk royalty.

        “You two have been invaluable,” Karenena continued, her five mercenaries moving into the room around her. “Because of your work, we’ve won! We’ve come back into power. With me in charge, Pangea will thrive.”

        “You’re not the heir.” This was Elena. She’d finally spoken up. I understood her emotions now—I knew where this was going.

        Elena, even with her infected shoulder, stood tall at my side. Her chin was raised and her sword bloody. She looked strong, hair short and cropped, her beauty underspoken but undeniable. We had come far, she and I. We’d faced many challenges. We’d grown.

        “Under _Malachi_ , Pangea will blossom,” I said, my words a challenge to what was obviously going on here.

        “Yes, well,” Karenena shrugged. “Malachi will die soon. It’s been arranged—I’ll put it into motion when I return. And then I’ll be unopposed. It’s for the greater good, Mathias, surely you can see that?”

     “Mathias,” Elena whispered. I knew what she wanted.

     “Okay.”

     We moved at the same time. As always, we were united, equal parts of a machine. In moments like this, we shared a brain. I lunged at Karenena. Elena went after two of the mercenaries to our left.

     We had faced worse odds before, the two of us, and we had always come out on top. Karenena dodged my initial swipe, but cutting her had never been my intention. In the time it had taken her to move, I had drawn my gun and fired. _Bang._

     It wasn't a clean shot. It hit her shoulder, but the pain was enough to bring her to her knees. I had my knife to her throat when I felt the fire in my abdomen, felt the heat spreading and leaking.

      _Damn it._

     With a jerk of my wrist, Karenena died. My knife had sliced firmer necks than hers.

     Elena managed the two she’d pursued easily enough. She was finishing off the second one when one of the three remaining mercenaries charged her. We had never been meant to survive this. We were part of a whole and this mission had been more than Zaler’s death sentence. Zaler's death would bring about a new beginning. It would be the ending before a new start. Elena and I weren't meant to see the new age.

     But we had defied fate before. Watch it stop us now.

     As the man charged Elena, he took a bullet to the back of his head. He fell forward and his brains joined the bloody mess of our floor. Elena finished her fight with a dignified disdain.

     Two left. Two versus Elena and I.

     “Game on,” Elena said, grinning as she turned her eyes to me.

     I met her smile and fell to my knees.

     Her eyes were wide, wet, _angry_. She stabbed Number Four in the eye socket in her haste to make it to my side. He joined the ground’s harem, taking her knife with him as he fell.

     Number Five was next. Elena was ferocious, tearing into the man with a snarl on her face all the while. When Number Five joined the party on the floor, she stomped her heel into his face, defacing his body. He'd no chance to defend himself. He was weaponless, after all.

     Number Five had lost his sword in my stomach.

     I'd been impaled before, but I had been lucky that time. Nothing major had been harmed and Malachi had spoiled me with Remedium. Not this time. The advanced medicine wouldn't have done much, either way.

     I wasn't meant to survive this. I was expendable. But Elena, my dear companion and faithful partner, she had made it this far. Together she and I had defied fate—but this time, only she would survive.

     “Mathias, Mathias, Mathias.” Elena knelt in front of me, looking at my wound in dismay. The sword was still inside of me, hot and burning. “Mathias, you fool…” She was sobbing.

     “Get out of here,” I said. I already sounded weak. “Go. Protect Malachi, Elena. Please.”

     “You stupid boy,” she cried. “So stupid.”

     She kept talking. Her lips were moving but I couldn't hear her. I could barely see her. I couldn't concentrate on much but the red.

     This small room was so full of red. What a wretched color. And _my_ red, too, my blood, was joining the miserable stain on the floor.

      _I'm sorry, Malachi._

    I no longer saw the room but a pair of eyes so blue, so so so **blue**.  That blue had followed me my whole life, had comforted me. That blue had taught me the definition of faith. It had been the only god in my life. It had become my universe.

     I wouldn't see the new beginning but it was here. It would be bright and so much better than the previous act. My guardian blue would look over it, though different than before.

     There was the red leaking in, tainting the beautiful cerulean hue a mournful purple. The universe would grieve but it would heal and it would become stronger than before.

     That's the ending of my era. Here's the start of yours.


End file.
